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If the information requested by the applicant is in the possession of the APIO should he/she not give that information to the applicant?

Posted On February 6, 2016 by &filed under .

If the information requested by the applicant is in the possession of the APIO should he/she not give that information to the applicant?

Under the RTI Act, the APIO’s obligation is confined to forwarding the request to the PIO concerned forthwith – within five days.

It depends on why you asked for that information and what type of information is it. Often a lot of things start falling in place just by asking for information. For instance, you would get your passport or a ration card just by asking for the status of your application. In many cases, roads got repaired as soon as the “money spent” on repairs was asked. So, seeking information and questioning the government is an important step, which in itself is complete in many cases.

But suppose you expose some corruption or wrongdoing using RTI. Then, you can complain to vigilance agencies, CBI or even file an FIR.

But one thing is certain. Seeking information like this and exposing the corruption does improve the future. The officials get a clear message that the people of that area have become alert and any wrongdoings in future would not remain hidden as they were in the past. So, their risks of getting caught increase.